Akenham

Akenham was a small Suffolk village a hundred and fifty years ago, then lying in deep countryside on the north-west side of Ipswich. Now you can barely call it a hamlet. Most of the village has vanished: there's a few cottages; there's a farm; and next to the farm is a church, rather hidden by trees. In 1878 that church was the scene of one of the country's greatest modern religious scandals. It led in 1880 to a change in the law concerning burials - immediately affecting everyone in the country, for death was commonplace, particularly infant death. And it was the burial of a toddler who had died that caused the scandal. 

The toddler was exactly two years old: little Joseph Ramsay. He died on his second birthday. At the time, his father had the right to request a burial in the parish churchyard, which could not be denied, and the Anglican rector had a legal duty to attend. The rector could not however conduct a burial service himself if the dead person had not been baptised. This toddler hadn't been: he'd been born into a Baptist family, and his baptism would have been deferred until he was a young adult. 

Although the Anglican rector could not conduct the burial service, he had a duty to witness the event, which by implication meant remaining present until any alternative service had finished. There was such a service, in the field opposite the church, conducted by a Congregationalist minister from Ipswich who had been invited to speak. Those proceedings began late, and kept the Anglican rector waiting, no doubt glancing often at his watch, and gradually growing very impatient. Eventually fuming, he locked the churchyard gates and went home for his tea - but not before there was an ugly exchange of words with the bereaved father. Once the service was over, the father had to lift the little coffin over the churchyard wall, and spade his child into the ground without any kind of official presence to see and possibly bless the event, because the parish rector had gone off in a huff.   

This was the era of formidable vicars who might well be as touchy and awkward as the local squire. It was also the era of Nonconformist churches of all flavours, all of which were a thorn in the side of the established Anglican Church of England. This rector felt only disapproval: the little boy's bereaved father a Baptist, not an Anglican; wanting a non-Anglican (and therefore irregular) burial rite at an inconvenient time; and the thing conducted by an imported Congregationalist minister, rather than the proper parish incumbent. 

Well, the burial was done, but it didn't end there. A newspaper in Ipswich, known for its support for Nonconformist churches, quickly got hold of the story and ran with it, publishing a heavily critical report that the rector saw. He felt personally attacked - and without justification, as he had (in his view) done his duty - however barely - and could not be criticised. A lawsuit followed. The rector 'won', but was awarded only token damages. Meanwhile, the whole country had been shocked by the affair, and this led to the passing of the 1880 Burial Laws Amendment Act, which at last made it perfectly legal to conduct any appropriate burial service, or none at all.

As readers know, I am not religious, but I'd known about this nineteenth-century event at Akenham for decades. I'd looked the location up on the map, but had never been there. Now I was staying not far away. It was time to go and see for myself. It was 12th July, a bright and fairly sunny day, although rain was forecast later. 

I parked Fiona at the side of a farm track which led uphill through cornfields edged with poppies. It would have been a bucolic dream, except for the twin lines of electricity pylons that strode across the scene. Still, I could make some half-decent pictures of them, set against that cloudy sky:

The gravel track went steadily upwards (and northwards) to a junction with another track. I then had to jink westwards to the still-hidden church. This map should show what I mean. I was parked near where it says 'Ppg Sta' towards the bottom right corner of the map.

I began to get glimpses of the church and churchyard as I approached closer. Soon I stood by the churchyard gate that the rector had locked in such a marked manner before stalking off.

It wasn't a very substantial barrier. But any kind of locked gate is a powerful symbol of access denied. Opposite was that field where the alternative Nonconformist service had been conducted, much to the rector's disgust.

It was easy to imagine the grieving parents, the black-coated minister, and a small group of friends and well-wishers in workaday attire, with the rector pacing up and down nearby.

So to the church. Incredibly rural in feel. Very simple inside. It was now in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.

It would of course look rougher in little Joseph Ramsay's time. There was a stone memorial plaque on a window ledge that replicated the words on his gravestone. Tap on the picture, to enlarge it and read it more easily.

There was also a framed board with the burial story on it.

The church was not only about Joseph Ramsay. Three farmworkers, apparently from the same family, had not come back from the First World War trenches. There was a cross to them outside, too.

The cross was near the entrance, on the favoured south side of the church. Where was the toddler's grave? I wasn't surprised to find it behind the church, on the shadowy north side - still of course on consecrated ground, but somewhat hidden away. Indeed, it was surprising that there was a gravestone at all. But I suppose there had been a whip-round to pay for one, with possibly the newspaper contributing, considering the nationally-important outcome of that make-do burial in 1878.

The grave wasn't hard to find - the burial story was fairly well known, and many people might want to make a pilgrimage to Akenham. So the surrounding grass was well-trodden. Well, I'd made my own pilgrimage. 

Coming away, walking back to Fiona with my right leg telling me I'd overdone it, and a pitter-patter of rain telling me that I might get drenched, it struck me that I was most unlikely to be buried when I died. No, I'd be gone in a puff of smoke in some crematorium. Unless, of course, it was by then mandatory to be recycled. (Hmm. As in the 1973 film Soylent Green, perhaps?)